4,000-year-old 'shaman' burial near Stonehenge has a golden secret

Stone tools found in a 4,000-year-old grave near Stonehenge have traces of gold on their surfaces that indicate they were used to fashion gold ornaments.

In 1801, archaeologists found the assemblage of Bronze Age artifacts, including the stone tools, in a barrow or burial mound from about 1800 B.C. near the village of Upton Lovell, about 10 miles (16 kilometers) west of Stonehenge.

The assemblage(opens in new tab) includes flint axes, a necklace of beads of polished stone and dozens of bone points — possibly from another necklace and the fringe of a garment. The collection, which is now on display at the Wiltshire Museum in the town of Devizes, was interpreted at that time as the grave goods of a "shaman" or holy man.

Researchers discovered the traces of gold on the stone tools during a reanalysis of the artifacts using modern archaeological techniques, which included using a scanning electron microscope and an X-ray spectrometer to verify the presence of any residues and determine their chemical make-up.

The study confirmed that the traces of gold on the tools are prehistoric, and that they have similar impurities to other sources of gold used in Bronze Age Britain.

Crellin said that the wear on the stone tools also shows they were used in different ways to shape gold and a variety of other materials, such as amber, wood, copper and jet — a finely grained, semi-precious form of coal.

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